First, thanks for the credit and photos of the arts & crafts blanket chest that I built from the April 2010 issue of Woodworkers Journal. As I mentioned in my letter [which was run in the June 2011 issue], I was planning to make three more of the chests for my daughter and her two girls, theirs to be used as a ‘hope chest’. I finished the three down-sized chests yesterday, trying to make them to scale of the original version, and finished them out with the asphalt stain treatment and then waxing with tudor brown Briwax.

The chests are 18″ X 18″ X 30 1/2″ for the chest, with the tops being 32″ X 20″. As I counted, there are approximately 90 individual parts, not counting the boards individually for the tops or the bottoms or the splines, with 28 mortises and tenons. Quite an undertaking, but I am pleased with the results. Each time I assembled one of the chests I learned something that made the next one easier to assemble. Having purchased the lumber through my son-in-law in Mississippi I got better quality lumber at a better price. Each chest cost about $200.00, including hardware and finishes.